Word: muroc
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...high altitudes. As they streak down to destruction, telemetering instruments report their performance by radio. After the airplane itself is assembled, the "contractor's" test pilots have the ticklish job of easing it into the air. In the case of high-speed aircraft, this is generally done at Muroc; civilian pilots like the field as much as the Air Force does. Untested aircraft are shipped all the way to Muroc from the Atlantic Coast...
...Regulars. Most test pilots stay only a short time at Muroc, coming & going with their "projects," i.e., the aircraft on which they are making tests. Colonel Boyd, a strict but much-beloved "Old Man," is there a great deal. His pilots testify that "he does everything we do" and he is one of the six Air Force men who have flown faster than sound in the X-1.* ("The Old Man did fine," says Chuck.) In 1947, Test Pilot Boyd also set a new world's speed record (623.8 m.p.h.) over Muroc Lake in a specially built...
Chuck Yeager, Major Cardenas (Chuck's C.O. as well as the pilot who takes the X-1 aloft), and Flight Engineer Jackie Ridley are permanent at Muroc. The X-1 is not a transient project but the Air Force's first "research airplane," and it needs both Muroc's room and its walled-off secrecy. The X-1 was never intended as an "operational airplane"; it is more like a flying wind tunnel. Its big advantage is that its rockets, which produce a thrust of 6,000 Ibs., are not weakened, like "air-breathing" engines, by high...
Inside the X-1 are intricate recording instruments that total more than 500 Ibs. This week, as Chuck brought the plane down once again, the records were greedily grabbed, as usual, by Muroc's scientists and airplane designers. Already the records have had a profound effect on high-speed modern aircraft. When production aircraft fly faster than sound, as scientists are sure they will one day, their pilots will thank the X-1, the first airplane to pass through the transonic zone and bring back information...
Happy Bottom. With its red dust, desolation and run-down buildings, Muroc is not an attractive place to live. But for the test pilots like Chuck, who do not have to live on the post, it is not too bad. The mountain-ringed desert, with its mourning Joshua trees, has a kind of austere beauty. On its broad plain are little oases - alfalfa farms kept green by diesel-pumped water. There is hunting and riding. When these rural pleasures pall, Los Angeles is only 70 miles away (eleven minutes as the jet flies...